It's my way or the highway, warns Jose as he prepares to meet Chelsea squad

Jose Mourinho will greet Chelsea’s players next month with a welcoming smile accompanied by a stark warning: they must toe the line or face a quick exit from Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea have had seven different managers since Mourinho’s acrimonious departure in 2007 and last year came under fire from then-Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson, who bemoaned the rise of player power in the English game and suggested that the club’s high turnover of managers was a result of such excessive influence.

In recent years, Chelsea’s reputation has also been damaged by controversies and Mourinho, who is desperate to ensure that his bid for success is not derailed by a divided squad and further scandals, has warned his players that it will be his way or the highway from now on.

I'll do it my way: Jose Mourinho says Chelsea's players must not be selfish if they are to achieve success

Triumph: Mourinho said the same thing to his players in his first spell in 2004, which saw him win the league

He said: ‘There is something I say at every club I go to, and I’m going to say it again when I meet the players on July 10.

It’s a sentence that I always say on the first day: ‘If you are a top professional, if you are not a selfish person, if you put the club in front of yourself, and if you are here to work 100 per cent for me, for your fellow players and for the club, we will have a wonderful relationship. If you are selfish, if you don’t care about the fans, then we are in big trouble.

Not overwhelmed: Mourinho described Fernando Torres' performances at Chelsea as 'so-so'

‘Sometimes you have a couple of guys that are not too keen to accept these kind of rules and this is where you have some problematic relationships, and the club in that moment either supports the problematic player or the manager. If the clubs support the manager, the two little guys — gone, easy.’

The manager was less direct, however, when it came to providing Fernando Torres with assurances regarding his Chelsea future.

In a move that will have done little to raise the Spaniard’s hopes, Mourinho described the striker’s performances as ‘so-so’.

Desperation: Divides in the camp were rumoured to lead to Chelsea sacking Andre Villas-Boas last year